Black River courses

receive NRA label

Black River Technical College is one of only four affiliated colleges in the country — and the only in Arkansas — selected to offer the National Rifle Association’s “short-term gunsmithing courses,” according to the college.

To become an approved NRA gunsmithing school, colleges must have “an existing gunsmithing program, minimum three years, with full-time students currently enrolled in classes, knowledgeable and experienced instructors, and proper facilities to host potential students,” according to the college.

The other three colleges — Trinidad State in Colorado, Murray State College in Oklahoma and Montgomery Community College in North Carolina — have been NRA affiliates for 49 years, 32 years and 10 years, respectively. Black River Technical College’s program started in 2020, according to the college.

Leaders from the three NRA-affiliated colleges made a March 26 site visit to Black River Technical College to interview program staff and students, examine the gunsmithing classroom and its machine tool lab, and evaluate the safety and comprehensiveness of the program’s criteria.

Black River faculty and administration “have done an excellent job of establishing a Gunsmithing curriculum program,” Mark Dye, director of the Gunsmithing Department at Montgomery Community College, said in a news release from the school. “This is a difficult task, and one that that is compounded by the lack of local existing programs to collaborate with.”

Black River’s program, which has awarded 125 credentials, offers three certificates of proficiency in gunsmithing technology — riflesmithing, shotgunsmithing and pistolsmithing. The school also offers a technical certificate in gunsmithing technology with a rifle emphasis and an Associate of Applied Science in gunsmithing technology.

UA-EACC names 3

chancellor finalists

The University of Arkansas System has named three finalists in a search for the next chancellor at the University of Arkansas – East Arkansas Community College, with each candidate planning to visit campus later this month.

Chancellor Cathie Cline plans to step down July 1 after nearly a decade leading the college in Forrest City. The finalists are Scott Kuttenkuler, president of Arkansas Rural Health Academy; Adam O’Neal, East Arkansas Community College’s vice chancellor for student services; and Steve Rook, chancellor of Arkansas State University Three Rivers.

UA System President Jay B. Silveria will ultimately recommend one of the finalists for approval to the UA System Board of Trustees.

Kuttenkuler has a bachelor’s and master’s degree from the University of Central Missouri, along with a doctorate of education from Arkansas State University. He previously served as vice chancellor of the Saline County Career Technical Campus, according to the UA System, and has held leadership roles at Southeast Arkansas College and the University of Arkansas at Monticello.

O’Neal has worked in both higher education and K-12 schools, including as a principal and a classroom educator. He has a bachelor’s degree from Arkansas State University and a master’s degree from Southern Arkansas University, and is pursuing a doctorate in education leadership from Liberty University. Before his appointment as vice chancellor, he served as UA-East Arkansas Community College’s dean of student services.

Rook, a first-generation college student, earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Arkansas at Monticello, a master’s degree from Eastern Illinois University and a doctorate from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. He has served as associate dean of students at UA-Little Rock and in various roles at the University of Arkansas Community College at Rich Mountain, according to the UA System. Rook was also a finalist last year for chancellor at the University of Arkansas Community College at Hope-Texarkana.

Cline, the outgoing chancellor, has worked for the college more than a quarter century. She helped guide East Arkansas Community College to membership in the UA System and led the merger of the college and Crowley’s Ridge Technical Institute in 2018.

UA-East Arkansas Community College, which also has a satellite location in Wynne, has grown its enrollment for five consecutive years. Fall 2025 enrollment was up 11.2% from fall 2024, from 1,399 students to 1,566. It has the largest five-year head count growth among the state’s public colleges and universities, according to the college.